Honduras 08- Part 3

It’s Wednesday morning and our trip is quickly coming to an end; it’s always a sad time when one of our trips comes to an end. We have to leave friends and family here. It’s amazing how quickly you can create a bond with people in another place and from another culture. The Lord God is God of all the earth, and it’s so very easy to love people. In Honduras the people we work with are so kind and gracious. They are so appreciative of what “little” we can do in such a short period of time, but I am so grateful for the opportunity to serve them.

Tuesday was a very interesting day for me. I got sick Monday night after supper and haven’t eaten anything since then (through Wednesday morning). But what made yesterday interesting was the time I was able to spend with 6 local pastors, when I say local I mean they traveled and hour or more to come and allow me to teach them. I am so overwhelmed at the responsibility and possibility for disciple-making which can come from the 6 hours of teaching on Monday and Tuesday. God I pray that you would multiply and duplicate in them the things they have seen and heard.

After the teaching time yesterday, we rested for about an hour and then it was church time. The local church here meets every night but Monday night. Dave shared a tremendous testimony last night. It was a great encouragement. I preached last night out of John 3:1-21. I had to keep it short and sweet because of a certain “missionary blessing” that I have had the last few days, but I believe God blessed in spite of my ailment.

VBS has been going very well. Sue and Iris have shared the teaching responsibilities. Debbie and Judy have been taking care of the crafts, and Joy and Carrie have been handling the recreation time. Today has been the largest crowd so far. All of the chairs were full and children were standing around the room. At the end of the lesson today, they did a question and answer time reviewing the weeks VBS stories and awarding prizes to those who answered correctly. The children were so excited and enthusiastic; it blesses my heart to watch them.

One of the things I enjoy most during our trips is being able to do food ministry. We purchase food, bag it up and with the help of church members hit the streets of the community seeking out nonchurch members to minister to. We do this to meet a physical need but more importantly we do it to help the church establish a relationship with the family so that they can have a door of opportunity to minister in the future. We share the gospel as the Lord opens the door. It is always a great time. After we finish the food ministry we will gather once again with our brothers and sisters in Christ for worship. We will share testimonies, sing songs and the Word of God will be preached. At the conclusion of the service we will present the church with the items we collected from our church as a gift. They will use it to minister to others. The pastor will come back to the hotel with us and we will give him “the clothes off our backs.” He will take them home, his family will wash them, and they will use them for ministry to others.

Please continue to pray for the 3 of us who are suffering with the “missionary blessing.” Traveling will be very difficult in the condition we are currently in. Pray that God will touch are stomachs and settle them so that we can travel the 4.5 hours back to Tegucigalpa. I will try to put one last update on here tomorrow evening. Pray also for safety as we travel. There will be about 9 hours of travel in the van, plus the 4 or so hours of plane travel. Everyone says hello and we miss you. See you soon.

Serving Him,
Pastor Mike